On January 25, a week before the Florida primary, Mitt Romney sat down for an interview with Univision, the nationwide Spanish-language television network that reaches 97 percent of Latino households. It was a risky move for Romney, who, in a bid for conservative support, had gone farther than any of his remaining Republican rivals in denouncing reforms that would help undocumented immigrants gain legal status. His positions put him sharply at odds with the vast majority of Univision’s audience, with the network’s own editorial line, and most definitely with the opinions of its star news anchor, Jorge Ramos.

Yet there was Romney, opposite Ramos on a stage at Miami Dade College, trying to convince Univision’s viewers, many of whom live in Florida, that he was all for immigration—so long as it was done the right way. The questioning was civil but pointed at first. Then Ramos threw a curveball. The veteran broadcaster wanted to know whether Romney felt that he was a Mexican American, since his father was born in Mexico. The question put Romney, whose great-grandfather had fled the United States to avoid arrest for practicing polygamy, in a supremely awkward position. If he said yes, conservatives might think him even more suspect. But if he said no, he would lose one of the few opportunities he had to connect with a vitally important audience. “I would love to be able to convince people of that, particularly in a Florida primary,” Romney responded. “But I think that might be disingenuous on my part.” It was probably the best answer he could have given, but it provided the mainstream press, which covered the interview, with yet another squirm-inducing anecdote about the candidate. And it certainly didn’t help him with Latino voters.

If the Univision interview illustrates the rough road Romney has had to travel in his quest to become the GOP nominee, it also highlights what may be the biggest obstacle he’ll face in the general election: winning a significant share of the Latino vote. Hispanics are one of the fastest-growing minorities in the country, accounting for more than half of the total population growth over the last decade. (More than 50 million Hispanics now live in the United States—up from 35 million just ten years ago, according to census data.) In 2008, close to 10 million Hispanics voted—roughly 70 percent supported Barack Obama—and thus far their support for the president has not waned. More than 12 million Latinos are expected to vote this time around. Moreover, Hispanics are clustered in key swing states like Colorado, Nevada, North Carolina, Virginia, New Mexico, and Florida. Their influence could even put red states like Arizona into play in the presidential race, and might help determine control of Congress. In 2010, despite the Tea Party uprising that enabled Republicans to retake the House, Latinos helped the Democrats hang on to the Senate by propelling Harry Reid and Michael Bennet to victory in Nevada and Colorado, respectively.

Connecting with Latinos is now a top priority for both parties, and Univision is the main conduit. No other network comes close to its scope. On any given night, Univision draws in about 65 percent of the viewers watching Spanish-language TV; the network’s nearest competitor, NBC-owned Telemundo, recently broke briefly into the low thirties. The network is the fifth largest in the country in terms of prime-time ratings and routinely beats the big four—ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox—on Friday nights and in certain markets like Los Angeles and New York. Its offerings include everything from soap operas to political talk shows to investigative documentaries, all with a focus on the issues, themes, and personalities that are important to Hispanics. The company has built a relationship with its viewers that few other media organizations could even hope to understand. “Based on our research, there are two institutions in the Latino immigrant community that rank as highly trustworthy,” says Simon Rosenberg, president of the New Democratic Network, a think tank based in Washington, D.C. “They are the Catholic Church and Univision.”

If Univision is the most important Spanish-language network, then Ramos is the biggest, most trusted on-air personality on Spanish-language TV. Often referred to as the Walter Cronkite of Hispanic news, he connects with viewers on a nightly basis. An immigrant from Mexico with olive skin, green eyes, and silver hair, he has interviewed every sitting president since George H. W. Bush and most of the major White House hopefuls during that time, with the exception of Bob Dole in 1996. Along the way he has won eight Emmys and written eleven books, including A Country for All: An Immigrant Manifesto. Ninety-three percent of Univision viewers have a favorable view of him.

The GOP, of course, faces considerably lower favorables among Hispanics, and it’s easy to understand why. Rank-and-file Republicans have applauded controversial immigration laws in Arizona and Alabama that give police a mandate to detain people who look like they might be in the country illegally. They have embraced racial profiling and Joe Arpaio, the Maricopa County sheriff who rounded up undocumented Latinos and put them in an outdoor detention facility. For the past seven years, conservatives in Congress have been openly hostile to any immigration-reform bills that would provide a path to citizenship. The Republican presidential candidates have tripped over each other this cycle trying to turn hard right on immigration issues, supporting the idea of self-deportation and joking that the border fence should be electrified. Romney pilloried Newt Gingrich for suggesting that seventy-year-old undocumented grandmothers who have lived in this country for decades should be shown mercy, and he denounced Rick Perry’s support of a Texas law that provided undocumented college students with in-state tuition breaks. These were shrewd tactical moves that helped kill off both campaigns, but Romney has paid a price. Republicans need at least a third of the Latino vote to win the White House. McCain got 31 percent, and lost the electoral college by the biggest margin since Bill Clinton beat Bob Dole in 1996. Romney has been polling in the high teens and low twenties.

Romney desperately needs to turn these numbers around. And one way he’s widely expected to try to do so is by picking Marco Rubio, the junior senator from Florida, as his running mate. The theory is that, as a young, charismatic Cuban American, Rubio can reach out to the Latino electorate and narrow the rift between them and the GOP. But the most important venue for reaching those voters is Univision, a network that many Republicans think is biased toward Democrats, and with which Rubio in particular has a checkered history. Indeed, despite a standing request from Ramos, the Florida senator has refused to go on his show. If Rubio in fact becomes the nominee, he won’t be able to avoid Ramos much longer.

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Comments

Mikhail on May 08, 2012 8:38 AM:

Impressive article, and I greatly enjoyed it. It's nice to learn something new about the socio-political landscape.

Peter on May 09, 2012 10:38 PM:

Very interesting article. The Latino vote will clearly have a major impact on the 2012 Presidential election particularly in the swing states. Unless, of course, the Republicans success in disenfranchising too many Latinos.

Oilime on May 12, 2012 10:42 AM:

This story falls for the two most predominant fallacies about Hispanics/Latinos in the United States.

1. Hispanics are homogeneous. They're not, it's a very fractured ethnicity among races, nationalities, geographies and generations. A good example is how an older Cuban from New Jersey would vote as opposed to a compatriot in Miami.

2. Univision is perfect to cater to Hispanics/Latinos. As a former employee, I can tell you the stats are quite underwhelming. There's a strong correlation between lack of integration and low income levels and Univision viewers. Those Hispanics/Latinos with a higher income and who are more integrated and will not watch Jorge Ramos.

NiKolas Garza on May 12, 2012 6:50 PM:

Ramos is an excellent Journalist. His only sin is that he strongly supports Corrupted PRI's Candidate Enrique Pe├▒a Nieto "@EPN" in the coming Mexican Presidential Elections in July. Right @joregarmosnews?

Rosalba Martinez on May 24, 2012 4:12 PM:

You are right Oilime, on your two points that you mentioned. Univision now shares something in common$$ with Televisa, Televisa put money on Univision, on an interview by Carmen Aritegui to Jorge Ramos, he could not even express an authentic thought.He is not what he was at some point. The Hispanic with education in USA do not watch his crap. he is a cheap tv show!

2schultz on May 24, 2012 4:21 PM:

here is what is happening in Mexico and he does not even mention anything about it. He is supporting a EPN. this is a little part of the letter from students #132 movement in Mexico. I would say he helps manipulates the media and info.
Mexican affairs do not start and end in bloodshed, massacres, beheadings and drug related violence. Despite the fact that it is a significant and chilling phenomenon, last week Mexican people, especially university students gave the world a lot to talk aboutů however it seems international press is not paying attention.
Again the national media covered the story, reducing considerably the numbers that attended and implying it might have been fostered by other parties running for elections. But the students are awake and united; all other major universities have joined the cause, as well as other members of the community demanding change. They hope to provide accurate information for voters on the elections and more than anything to try to make history. They want to challenge the powers that have kept Mexico stagnant: one of them is the media.
and obvoulsly Jorge Ramos too

Bill Carrothers on May 30, 2012 10:30 AM:

Laura M. Colarusso must be stone-cold ignorant of what happened to John McCain in the 2008 election. Nicknamed "Juan" McCain by those of us who were disgusted by his blatant Hispandering in supporting the "Just hand the Keys to this Nation to anybody who walked across the border or over-stayed their Visa Bill", (aka "True Immigration Reform"), he was resoundingly trumped in the contest for Latino votes by a whopping 35 percentage points. His enraged cursing of the incompetent advisers of his who claimed that sucking up to the "Nation of Immigrants" (rather than Nation of Americans) crowd would gain him anything other than contempt and scorn is still echoing in Arizona today.

As for Jorge Ramos, I think the reason that I have never heard of him is that, when I watch Univision, I switch channels as soon as those magnificent cleavages and gorgeous legs of the soap-opera stars disappear. With such awesome distractions, how do Latinos manage to get so much work done?

Gil Jimenez on May 30, 2012 4:52 PM:

No comment for now. Later

SouthAmerican on July 09, 2012 12:47 PM:

I agree 100% with you, Oilime on May 12, 2012 10:42 AM:,
Jorge Ramos is a bad journalist. Completely sold by the illegal immigration agenda. I don't listen to his cheap crap.

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